J. M. Adovasio

Upper Palaeolithic fibre technology : interlaced woven finds from Pavlov I, Czech Republic, c. 26,000 years ago

The later Palaeolithic sites of Moravia, the region of the Czech Republic west of Prague and north of Vienna, continue to provide remarkable new materials. To the art mobilier for which Dolni Věstonice and Pavlov have been celebrated, there has recently been added the technologies of groundstone and ceramics — and now woven materials, interlaced basketry or textiles, again of a kind one expects only from a quite later era.

On a pleistocene human occupation at Pedra Furada, Brazil

The last decades of fieldwork have not decisively upset the long-held view that the settlement of the Americas occurred in the very latest Pleistocene, as marked in North America by the Clovis archaeological horizon at about 11,200 years ago, and by a variety of contemporaneous South American industries. Yet there are several sites that may prove to be older, among them Pedra Furada, in the thorn forest of northeastern Brazil, a large and remarkable rock-shelter, whose Pleistocene deposits have been interpreted as containing clear evidence of human occupation. This paper offers a considered view of Pedra Furada from three archaeologists with a wide range of experiences in sites of all ages in the Americas and elsewhere, but who also share a special interest and expertise in the issues Pedra Furada has raised: Meltzer from long study of the peopling of the Americas and the frame of thinking within which we address that issue (Meltzer 1993a; 1993b); Adovasio from his intensive excavations and analysis of the Meadowcroft Rockshelter in Pennsylvania, the prime North American pre-Clovis candidate (Adovasio et al. 1990; Donahue & Adovasio 1990); and Dillehay from his work at the Monte Verde site in Chile, a site in which extraordinary preservation has produced a rich archaeological record with radiocarbon ages in excess of 12,500 years b.p. (Dillehay 1989a; in press). At the invitation of the Pedra Furada team, the three travelled to Brazil last December to participate in an international conference on the peopling of the Americas, and see first-hand the evidence from Pedra Furada.

Palaeolithic perishables made permanent

Previous research has documented textile and basketry production at Moravian Upper Palaeolithic sites, c.27,000 BP. Recent research extends these technologies to Russia and Germany, and amplifies information on perishable fibre artefacts from France. Collectively, these data illustrate the ubiquity of perishable technologies across the late Pleistocene world.

Chronology, mound-building and environment at Huaca Prieta, coastal Peru, from 13 700 to 4000 years ago

Renewed in-depth multi-disciplinary investigation of a large coastal mound settlement in Peru has extended the occupation back more than 7000 years to a first human exploitation ~13720 BP. Research by the authors has chronicled the prehistoric sequence from the activities of the first maritime foragers to the construction of the black mound and the introduction of horticulture and monumentality. The community of Huaca Prieta emerges as innovative, complex and ritualised, as yet with no antecedents.

Cultural stratigraphy at Mezhirich, an Upper Palaeolithic site in Ukraine with multiple occupations

The later Palaeolithic sites on the East European plain are celebrated for their solid buildings constructed of mammoth bones. Were these permanent settlements, occupied all the year round? Or were they seasonally occupied, in a land where winters are harsh? Stratigraphic explorations at Mezhirich, and excavation of the empty space between the buildings, leads to a decisive interpretation.

Perishable Industries from the Windover Bog: An Unexpected Window into the Florida Archaic

Multi-disciplinary excavations at the Windover Bog site (8BR246) in 1986 and 1987 yielded a remarkably well-preserved but very fragile corpus of fiber-based and wood artifacts in direct association with a series of Early Middle Archaic burials. This suite of mid-sixth millennium B.C. materials includes not only the oldest textiles from the American Southeast but also sophisticated basketry, cordage, and wood items previously undocumented (and unanticipated!) at this time horizon in this part of Florida. The textile assemblage includes close-simple and close-diagonal twining, both with S-Twist wefts (paired and trebled); open twining with paired, Z-Twist wefts; and balanced plain weave. Significantly, many of these items are in the form of non-heddle loom-woven cloth. Represented forms include circular or globular bags, hoods, blankets, clothing, and what may be intentionally produced burial shrouds. Also observed are twisted and braided cordage, composite fiber, and fiber and wood construction. The wood assemblage includes a wide array of forms from minimally modified burial “stakes” to complex, extensively worked, “dumbbell“-style mullers. The Windover fiber and wood assemblage is summarized and compared to others in North and South America and the myriad roles of perishable industries are discussed in terms of the lives and deaths of their makers.

Perishable Fiber Artifacts and Paleoindians: New Implications

Recent research demonstrates that perishable industries—notably including the manufacture of textiles, basketry, cordage, netting, and sandals—were a well-established, integral component of the Upper Paleolithic technological milieu in many parts of the Old World. Moreover, extant data suggest that these technologies played a vital and, hitherto, utterly unappreciated role in the ecological success of late Pleistocene populations, including the first Americans. This article explores the varied roles of early fiber technology in the New World and specifically examines the adaptive qualities, impact on social organization, and alteration to food procurement strategies implicit in this innovative and intensive series of interrelated industries. It is suggested that the manufacture of perishable fiber-derived artifacts was far more important in the successful colonization of this hemisphere than any of the more durable artifact classes, particularly stone.

“Their Fingers Were too Fat to Weave”: Ancient Textiles and Academic Politics Today:

In 1993, we recognized textile impressions on fragments of fired clay from Upper Paleolithic sites in Moravia, which documented the worlds oldest weaving, net making, and basketry. We published this discovery first in Czech in their premier professional journal and in collaboration with Moravian colleagues. Subsequently, this evidence was augmented by new data from across Eurasia, the recognition of textile products on the “Venus” figurines, and the identification of tools used to make them. Our discovery received a bifurcate reception. While scholars outside of the Czech Republic accepted it readily, local academics split into feuding factions. Below we discuss the evidence for Paleolithic textiles and use its reception to illustrate that: 1) the deep past necessarily lives in the political present, and 2) the present is contested and multi-vocal. Our article also serves to raise the questions of whose voice to privilege, and why.