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The Paisley Caves are located in the Summer Lake basin near Paisley, about 220 miles southeast of Eugene on the eastern side of the Cascade Range. The series of eight caves are westward-facing, wave-cut shelters on the highest shoreline of pluvial Lake Chewaucan, which rose and fell in periods of greater precipitation during the Pleistocene.
The photo shows Dennis Jenkins in his University of Oregon lab, displaying a drawer full of artifacts, including ropage and threads, found in the Paisley Caves. "To find these threads was just incredible," he said.
Photo: Jim Barlow
Photo and text: University of Oregon Media Relations site.
Text above adapted from Wikipedia.
The arid lands around Summer Lake were once lush. During the Pleistocene Era, vast areas of this region of south central Oregon were covered by lakes and wetlands. As the last ice age was ending, rain and runoff from melting snow filled the lowlands throughout this region of the Great Basin, creating an immense, freshwater lake called Lake Chewaucan. The lake covered 461 square miles (1 190 km²) at depths of up to 375 feet (114 m).
Lake Chewaucan covered the Summer Lake basin and drainage system during much of the late Pleistocene Era. The last high water period is thought to have occurred about 13 000 years ago.
Lake Chewaucan began to dry up at the close of the Pleistocene Era. As it shrank, salts and alkali were concentrated in its remaining waters. The exposed lake bottom sediments were blown by the prevailing westerly winds to form the sand dunes that still lie on the east side of Summer Lake.
Today, Summer Lake and Abert Lake are separated by twenty miles, and are the only remnants of Lake Chewaucan. Summer Lake is approximately 20 miles (32 km) long and 10 miles (16 km) wide; however, the lake shrinks during summer and expands, sometimes dramatically, in spring time. -
Text above adapted from Wikipedia.
A sweeping view looking out from inside one of the Paisley Caves.
The Paisley Caves complex is a system of caves and rock shelters in an arid, desolate region of south-central Oregon, United States. One of the caves contains archaeological evidence of the oldest definitively-dated human presence in North America. The site was first studied by archeologists in the 1930s. Scientific excavations since 2002 have uncovered substantial new discoveries.
Photo: University of Oregon Media Relations site.
A field school from the University of Oregon has been examining the site since 2002 and analyzing its pre-Clovis artifacts. In the summer of 2007, they identified the oldest human DNA yet discovered in the American continents. This assertion is based on several samples of coprolite (fossilized excrement) found in the Paisley Caves complex, between Lakeview and Bend, Oregon, on the eastern side of the Cascade mountain range.
The Paisley Caves were cut by waves at a time of high water levels in the nearby lake, which is now a flat, dry area near the caves.
The fossils were found in Paisley Five Mile Point Cave at the same level as a small rock-lined hearth some 7 feet (2 m) below the modern surface. At that level was also discovered a large number of bones from waterfowl, fish, and large mammals including extinct camel and horse. Radiocarbon dating places these coprolites between 12 750 and 14 290 calendar years before the present, probably representing a pre-Clovis occupation. DNA analysis provides apparent genetic ties to Siberia or Asia.
Photo: University of Oregon Media Relations site.
Fossilised faeces found in the caves
Evidence at other archaeological sites — as well as 1930s work at Paisley Caves — had also been thought to provide such evidence, but questionable excavation techniques clouded the issue. Knowing this, the University of Oregon team worked carefully to avoid the mistakes of the past. The theory that Pre-Clovis immigrants traveled to North America down the Pacific Coast suggests that the travelers would have passed through the hinterlands of what is Oregon today. The Paisley Caves, up-river from the Pacific Ocean along the Klamath River, are therefore an ideal spot to search for the evidence of such people. The fossils provide evidence of the groups possibly having lived there. DNA from coyote, fox, and dog (or wolf) were also found.
Photo: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7329505.stm
The caves are in the Summer Lake basin at 4 520 feet (1 380 m) elevation and face to the west in a ridge of Miocene and Pliocene era basalts mixed with soft volcanic tuffs and breccias from which the caves were carved by Pleistocene era waves from Summer Lake. The caves are located north of the city of Paisley, Oregon.
Photo from 1966 showing the University of Oregon's Luther Cressman, considered the "father of Oregon anthropology" on location at a small cave at Fort Rock Cave in Oregon. Cressman, acting on information given to him, found the Paisley Caves in about 1937, and, by 1940, he theorized that artifacts he had uncovered were older than those found at many other North American sites, but a lack of documentation hurt his cause.
Photo and text: University of Oregon Media Relations site.
(Note that the story is not so simple as that. See this story from http://www2.wi.net/~census/lesson40.html)
At Fort Rock Cave in 1938 archaeologists discovered nearly 100 sandals woven of sagebrush that had been shredded and twisted into strands. Many had mud baked into them and most were charred, for they lay beneath volcanic ash that apparently rained into the cave while still hot. At first the ash was identified as from an eruption of Mount Newberry (southeast of Bend); but now, with better methods of analysis, it is recognized as having come from Mount Mazama. This alone would indicate an age of at least 7 000 years.
Radiocarbon dating had not been developed at the time of the discovery, and even when it did become available the sandals could not be used. They had been sprayed with resin as a preservative and the radiocarbon method requires material absolutely free of contamination. There seemed to be no way to place the chronology of the sandals more precisely than sometime before the Mazama eruption. Then, by luck, someone digging about in Fort Rock Cave ten years after the original excavations found another sandal and some basketry. Radiocarbon dating of the sandals pushed the age back to 9 000 years.
Dennis Jenkins points to an area inside one of caves during a discussion with NewsHour correspondent Lee Hochberg.
Cut by waves at the height of the Pleistocene, these caves lie at an elevation of 4520 ft. above two prominent beach lines cut into the talus slope. As lake levels fell at the end of the Pleistocene the current Summer Lake Basin was hydrographically separated from the Chewaucan Basin sometime between 17 000 and 18 000 cal. BP. Water levels in both basins continued to fall until about 14 500 cal. BP when a resurgence in the Chewaucan Basin caused lake levels to rise above the 4388 ft. sill separating the two basins. The Chewaucan River then breached the gravel fan separating the two basins and began flowing north into the Summer Lake Basin. Over the next 2000 years high lake stands established prominent shorelines at elevations of roughly 4330, 4360, and 4380 ft. During much of this period water stood within one mile of the Paisley Caves, making occupation of the caves substantially more attractive than it has been since.
Photo: University of Oregon Media Relations site.
Mike Fallon, Cave 1 Stratigraphy
Cave 1, located at the south end of the site, is about 6 m long and 4 to 5 meters wide. The roof at the mouth of the cave has fallen since 1939. A pair of huge boulders now block direct access to the interior of the cave, covering a good portion of the deposits in the cave mouth. A narrow concavity extending under the larger of the two offered the near perfect location in which to excavate a series of 1x2 m test units in predominantly undisturbed deposits. Excavations continued to 230 cm through extremely dry deposits. The upper 80 cm of sediments contained sparse Middle and Late Holocene cultural deposits. Deposits between 80 and 160 cm are, for all practical purposes, culturally sterile though a small hearth and a few artifacts were encountered just below a lens of Mazama ash at approximately 120 cm. The oldest and densest cultural remains encountered in any of the caves were located between 190 and 230 centimeters. Radiocarbon dates of 8440, 7540, and 7445 have been obtained from sage brush charcoal, human feces, and a basketry fragment. Obsidian hydration readings on debitage recovered from 200 cm suggest that the earliest occupation samples date from about 11 000 cal. BP.
Photo: http://www.uoregon.edu/~ftrock/paisley_caves_description.php
NewsHour correspondent Lee Hochberg and Jenkins walk by a cave entrance while the film is rolling for an upcoming story.
Cave 2, located next to Cave 1, is roughly 7 meters long and 6 meters wide. Large boulders extend across most of the entrance at the dripline and access to the lower, central portion of the cave is obtained by way of a narrow path along the northeast wall. Intact deposits were encountered near the bottom of this path. UO excavations reached depths of 240 centimeters along the cave wall. Coprolites and perishable artifacts were relatively common in Late Holocene deposits. A thick lens of Mazama tephra marked the boundary of Early Holocene deposits. A coprolite located below Mazama tephra was dated to 8620 cal. BP. A small but dense charcoal lens, suggesting the presence of a hearth, was encountered at a depth of 200 centimeters, more than a meter below the tephra lens. What appear to be predominantly artiodactyl bones, split to facilitate the removal of the marrow, were recovered in large quantities around this feature along with lithic debitage and tools of various kinds including a short length of sagebrush rope, a wooden peg, a pumice abrader, and scrapers. A short fragment of Western Stemmed or Foliate point base was the only projectile point found in apparent association with the hearth. Charred processed edible tissues recovered from the charcoal lens were radiocarbon dated to a mean age of ca. 12 000 cal. BP. The sagebrush rope also produced a date of ca. 12 000 cal. BP. Horse and camel bones were encountered well above this hearth, but the presence of rodent dens near the location of their recovery suggests they may be in disturbed contexts.
Photo: University of Oregon Media Relations site.
Cave 3, mistakenly numbered Cave 4 by the field school, is roughly 4 meters deep and 7 meters wide. This is the cave from which Cressman recovered bones of bison, camel, horse, large dog (possibly wolf), fox and probably bear, as well as hawk, sagehen, pintail, and teal. UO excavations conducted during the 2002 field season were situated at the mouth of the cave in the area of a prominent berm composed of disturbed midden deposit. Excavations reached nearly 4 meters and were terminated among the heavily rounded boulders near the floor of the cave but not on bedrock. Cultural materials and bone were bimodally distributed in the undisturbed deposits below the disturbed deposits of the berm. Obsidian hydration measurements indicate the upper meter of deposits contain Middle and Late Holocene cultural materials. Mazama tephra deposits occur at about 130 cm, corresponding well with an obsidian hydration reading of 5.1 microns and a slight increase in cultural materials. After dropping off again to sterile deposits, cultural materials, particularly bone, increased again between circa 280 and 370 cm with the most notable peak occurring between 280 and 290 cm. Cave 5, located next to Cave 4, was not investigated by Cressman but has been heavily vandalized for many years. It is more than 6 m deep and 9 m wide. Our excavations generally skirted the vandalized portions of the cave, focusing on the south-central and north ends of the cave. A large block excavation removed part of the berm of disturbed midden in the south-central portion of cave mouth. Excavations there reached a maximum depth of 300 cm in a fine, moist, gravelly silt. Bone preservation was generally poor below a prominent lens of Mazama tephra due to the saturation of the sediments.
Photo: http://www.uoregon.edu/~ftrock/paisley_caves_description.php
Cassie Albush with Camel Vertebra
A camel vertebra was encountered at a depth of 224 cm, a camel astragalus was recovered at 228 cm, and various other camel foot bones were recovered scattered throughout the deposit. The astragalus was AMS dated to 14 290 cal. BP. Bison long bone fragments and a patella were also recovered along with the mandibles of an extinct goat. It is interesting to note that few of these bones can be considered good meat bones and none exhibit obvious evidence of butchery. However, two fragments of long bone do appear to have been broken by impact fractures while they were fresh to facilitate the removal of marrow.
Photo: http://www.uoregon.edu/~ftrock/paisley_caves_description.php
University of Oregon archaeologist Dennis Jenkins hands a heat-measuring device to a fellow excavator at the Paisley Caves.
A burned horse phalanx was recovered from a small charred feature that may have been a hearth. This small bowl-shaped ash feature, discovered at a depth of about 200 cm, may be cultural. It appears to have a rock lined base, and is at the depth that large mammal bones, waterfowl, and fish remains first increase dramatically over previous numbers, suggesting that this feature could have had a cultural origin and that it may date from an early time period. However, accepting it as a cultural feature must be approached cautiously since these highly organic deposits are prone to smolder for long periods of time once they begin to burn. Oxygen in rodent passages has allowed smoldering to continue deep below the surface in at least one instance in this portion of the cave. Consequently, this feature has not yet been dated, though ash samples were recovered from it for that purpose. However, a second horse phalanx was recovered from an adjacent 1x1 meter excavation unit at a depth of 210-215 cm. It produced an AMS date of 13 140 cal. BP. Human coprolites from this deposit have produced AMS radiocarbon dates as old as the camel astragalus.
Photo: http://ancient-tides.blogspot.com/2008/09/more-details-on-paisley-cave-discovery.html
Dennis Jenkins on site at Paisley Caves on the east side of the Cascades, about 220 miles southeast of Eugene, Ore.
Jenkins' recent work, including the discovery of camel bones and other foot bones, along with dried human faeces, coprolites, has proven - with the help of new technology - that Cressman was indeed correct.
Photos and Text: University of Oregon Media Relations site.
Camel foot bones and a camel ankle bone.
Photos and Text: University of Oregon Media Relations site.
In this photo Dr. Jenkins is shown holding a piece of human coprolite (dried faeces) that dates to 14 300 years ago.
Photos and Text: University of Oregon Media Relations site.
This is a question which is being hotly debated.
However this map of sea levels may give a clue as to the route taken, if not the method used - overland or via kayak, or some combination of both?
The photo was drawn to show the movement of mammoths at the end of the last ice age, but is invaluable for showing sea levels at the time humans first came to the Americas.
Red is for land above sea level containing mammoths, brown for land above sea level without mammoths.
Photo: Radiocarbon evidence of mid-Holocene mammoths stranded on an Alaskan Bering Sea island
R. Dale Guthrie
Institute of Arctic Biology, University of Alaska, Fairbanks, Alaska 99775, USA
NATURE | VOL 429 | 17 JUNE 2004 pp 746-749
