SCI Most scientists now reject the idea that the first Americans came by land

[Melodi]

I don't drink often but if we had booze in this apartment I'd have one, I'll setle for tea instead; I only regret my major professor didn't live long enough to see this;
he's probably having a drink somewhere in the Otherworld, possibly with some of the first ancestors to reach the Americas...lol

SO MUCH FOR THAT —
Most scientists now reject the idea that the first Americans came by land
Researchers embrace the kelp highway hypothesis in “a dramatic intellectual turnabout.”

ANNALEE NEWITZ - 11/4/2017, 8:50 PM

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It's been one of the most contentious debates in anthropology, and now scientists are saying it's pretty much over. A group of prominent anthropologists have done an overview of the scientific literature and declare in Science magazine that the "Clovis first" hypothesis of the peopling of the Americas is dead.

For decades, students were taught that the first people in the Americas were a group called the Clovis who walked over the Bering land bridge about 13,500 years ago. They arrived (so the narrative goes) via an ice-free corridor between glaciers in North America. But evidence has been piling up since the 1980s of human campsites in North and South America that date back much earlier than 13,500 years. At sites ranging from Oregon in the US to Monte Verde in Chile, evidence of human habitation goes back as far as 18,000 years.

FURTHER READING
More doubt cast on the idea that people took a land route to the Americas
In the 2000s, overwhelming evidence suggested that a pre-Clovis group had come to the Americans before there was an ice-free passage connecting Beringia to the Americas. As Smithsonian anthropologist Torben C. Rick and his colleagues put it, "In a dramatic intellectual turnabout, most archaeologists and other scholars now believe that the earliest Americans followed Pacific Rim shorelines from northeast Asia to Beringia and the Americas."

Now scholars are supporting the "kelp highway hypothesis," which holds that people reached the Americas when glaciers withdrew from the coasts of the Pacific Northwest 17,000 years ago, creating "a possible dispersal corridor rich in aquatic and terrestrial resources." Humans were able to boat and hike into the Americas along the coast due to the food-rich ecosystem provided by coastal kelp forests, which attracted fish, crustaceans, and more.

No one disputes that the Clovis peoples came through Beringia and the ice free corridor. But the Clovis would have formed a second wave of immigrants to the continent.

Despite all the evidence for human habitation, ranging from tools and butchered animal bones to the remains of campfires, scientists are still uncertain who the pre-Clovis peoples were. We have many examples of Clovis technology, with characteristic shapes for projectile points made from bone and stone. But we have no recognizable pre-Clovis toolkit.

FURTHER READING
Underwater discovery reveals 14,550 year-old Florida mastodon hunters
That may be about to change, however. The pre-Clovis people traveled along a now-drowned coastline, submerged after the last of the ice-age glaciers melted. New techniques in marine archaeology, ranging from ROVs to underwater lasers, are helping scientists explore ancient submerged villages. A team even turned up a 14,500-year-old campsite in Florida in a blackwater sinkhole last year.

FURTHER READING
Incredible discovery places humans in California 130,000 years ago
Rick and his colleagues write that the big question now is when pre-Clovis people actually arrived in the Americas. They suggest the arrival could be as early as 20,000 years ago on the verdant kelp highway. Other researchers, however, say people could have arrived during a temperate period about 130,000 years ago. A recent paper in Nature describes what appear to be the 130,000-year-old butchered remains of mastodons in California, along with sharp stones used to deflesh the animals. There is plenty of skepticism in the scientific community about this discovery, but the evidence can't be ignored.

To the best of our knowledge, the kelp highway brought humans to the Americas. Using boats and fishing tools, humans made it all the way from Asia to the Americas, founding many coastal communities along the way. And now for the next debate: who were they, and when exactly did they arrive?

Science, 2017. DOI: 10.1126/science.aao5473 (About DOIs).

ARS SCIENCE VIDEO >
A celebrationhttps://arstechnica.com/science/2017/11/majority-of-scientists-now-agree-that-humans-came-to-the-americas-by-boat/ of Cassini

 

[bw]

If they came along the beach, it's still coming by land. I'll grant that they may have moved their campsites a few miles at a time, but it's still a land-based migration being proposed here.

 

[marsh]

I tested my DNA against in an ancient DNA project of samples collected at various archaeological sites. http://www.y-str.org/p/ancient-dna.html My earliest matches are in Siberia. Then I have matches with Clovis boy in Montana and Kennewick man. I have no Native American heritage, so that must mean a group from the Siberian split off.

I also have matches with Must Farm - an archaeological site in Cambridgeshire, England where the Bronze Age community was built on posts off the marshy water.

http://www.mustfarm.com/bronze-age-settlement/about/

 

[Publius]

The old school academics that have control over what gets excepted are the problem. Why is it so hard for them to except the idea some of our ancient ancestors figured out how to make a raft or other form of boat and ended up here by accident I.E. blown out to sea and landed in some strange unknown place with no idea how to return to the home area they knew?

 

[ShadowMan]

Humans have been paddling and sailing the streams, rivers, lakes and oceans since logs have floated. The ancient Polynesians perfected long distance trans-oceanic traveling to a fine art. People today cross oceans on solo cruises in practically anything that floats so why is it so difficult to believe that ancient humans didn't travel the globe routinely?

Think about it. There weren't a lot of people on the planet back then. They practically had free rein of the entire world. The chances of even bumping into other groups of people was very rare considering the population on the planet. Other than critters you mostly had to deal with weather. So why wouldn't small groups of people wonder across the landscape? It seems only natural to me. Not surprising at all.

 

[Melodi]

If they came along the beach, it's still coming by land. I'll grant that they may have moved their campsites a few miles at a time, but it's still a land-based migration being proposed here.

The old "theory" (taught as fact for decades) was that the Clovis people "walked in" through a land bridge and corridor in the Ice; I note I got this article via a posting from the authors of People of the Wolf and in their novel this is a critical plot element but they are researchers first and not afraid to post information even when it conflicts with one of their early novels.

The "new" theory - that I would love to claim as I shocked my class 40 years ago by asking when the textbook said "and we know that people could ONLY have come over during a period when there was no ice on the Barring Straight and a lower sea level" and I asked "Why they don't have either now and people cross back and forth all the time using boats; we know they had boats back then..."

Of course, I never published that "theory" but my major professor, the one I mentioned above, did think the idea had a lot going for it but then he loved upsetting apple carts, especially apple carts for which there is only slim evidence.

The thing is that "Clovis Only" as it was called; would be funny (and probably will be seen as comical in the future) except that decades worth of careers were destroyed over it; frequently younger excavators would find "pre-Clovis" sights only to be threatened with never be published again, forced to "retract" their work or lose their jobs, etc, etc...all because a few people had "made" their "careers" on this theory and "everyone" had "better go along" or "else."

So yes, if they walked along the beach it would be a land migration; and I'm sure for some people it was, but the current theory and evidence so far (boats, fish hooks, oars etc) limited but there; suggest people traveling mostly by boat.

Doing so it would be possible for highly motivated people to go from Alaska to the tip of South America during one lifetime; it is more likely that people did it in gradual steps but there is no way to be certain about that; nor is there anything stopping traders once the coast was somewhat settled from going up and down it, the same way we know they went up and down the Mississippi River many thousands of years later.

The very first expedition to see if "anything" might be found on the old coastlines I saw in a documentary about eight years ago and they found fish hooks and other signs of human settlement or at least a camp; it is exactly where the researcher in question (whose modern hobbies are hunting and fishing) would have camped if he was looking for a place and it was still above the water.

It has taken a few years since that first "test;" underwater archeology is difficult, costly and dangerous (or why the entire area found settled between the UK and Denmark has barely been started on yet). Thankfully there were a lot of sites already "known" to be earlier than Clovis, it was just a matter of dusting off the excavation papers and re-testing the sites that had testable materials found there (which is how they got the early dates in the first place).

This is all early days and very exciting; now they just need to reopen the thought proccess to at least looking for possible migrations from Europe as well; since when the sea levels were lower it wouldn't have been that hard a treck along the ice either.

 

[marsh]

The Nautilus remote operated vehicle was surveying for deep underwater coastal caves this season. They were looking for potential ancient occupancy sites to map. I forget if it was around the channel islands or up by Washington state.

 

[Melodi]

Marsh, no one is saying that the Clovis people did not exist, or that they didn't likely come from Siberia (there is plenty of evidence that they did); it may even be that most or even all Native Americans alive today are their descendants; the DNA outcomes have been one of the last reasons clung to that Clovis Only meant ONLY Clovis in terms of history.

This ignores the fact that many scientists now believe there was up to a 90 Percent, let me repeat that up to 90 PERCENT - DIE OFF rate in North America after the European Diseases ran through the continent; often a couple of hundred years ahead of the future European settlers (who reported dead villages, empty spaces where fields had been a largely human-empty landscape; except for the ruins).

The evidence that was suppressed and ignored for over 50 years was/is that there were people living in the Americas before that time; they may or may not have DNA that survives in living people today but they did exist.

We KNOW that Clovis people have great-great-great umpteenth times great-Grandchildren living alive today; we don't know for certain let on the earlier groups.

They may have died out from the European Diseases, or perhaps thousands of years ago when the other great Mega Fauna started to decline or even perhaps; when there were asteroid strikes that left marks on the landscape or even a serious of disasters at the close of the ice age (horrific floods, volcanic and earthquake activity etc etc).

But not being around now, is very different from never existed at all; which is what the Clovis Only Die Hards were claiming.

 

[bw]

it would be possible for highly motivated people to go from Alaska to the tip of South America during one lifetime; it is more likely that people did it in gradual steps but there is no way to be certain about that; nor is there anything stopping traders once the coast was somewhat settled from going up and down it, the same way we know they went up and down the Mississippi River many thousands of years later.

I think gradual steps makes more sense. People would not have the sense of being on a migration, they would simply have set up a new base a couple miles down the beach when the local population grew to the point of feeling crowded.

Of course, once they had set up camps along a stretch of land, traders would be ready to travel the whole stretch in one go, knowing there were villages there to trade with.

 

[Melodi]

I think gradual steps makes more sense. People would not have the sense of being on a migration, they would simply have set up a new base a couple miles down the beach when the local population grew to the point of feeling crowded.

Of course, once they had set up camps along a stretch of land, traders would be ready to travel the whole stretch in one go, knowing there were villages there to trade with.

Exactly, I think it is unlikely but if you were writing the novel you COULD have some young folks; probably young men looking for wives and adventure made it pretty much all the way down and maybe even have one of them come back.

It is however, must more likely as you say that people went down gradually (though must faster than previously believed, it used to be thought it took thousands of years to get to South America, now we know some of the OLDEST finds are there) and once there were permanent camps established; then traders began to go up and down the route on a pretty regular basis.

We know they did that everywhere else in North and South America; so they were probably doing it 20,000 years ago or whenever there were enough people around to make it worth it - we know that one of the first things people do is trade; it seems hard-wired into us along with the more common "drives" we usually think of like sex, hunger, wanderlust, and violence (under some conditions).

 

[Sandune]

Man is known to be in Australia as early as 50,000 years ago. He didn't get there by crossing a land bridge.

 

[Melodi]

Man is known to be in Australia as early as 50,000 years ago. He didn't get there by crossing a land bridge.

When this was proven (and it may be 75,000 but it is at least 50,000) was when Clovis Only was already started to die and it sort of helped put a seal on the coffin.

At no point during the last 75,000 to 50,000 years was it possible to get to Australia WITHOUT using a boat/raft of some type; it wasn't as far as it is now, but you couldn't just walk there either.

And if people could sail to Australia; with the lower sea level, they could get just about anywhere, even if the hugged the sea ice and then the coastal routes; which is pretty much how most shipping was done until the late Middle Ages in Europe and Asia.

There were a few people, like the Phoenicians whose boats could possibly have survived the open sea (and may have) but it was the Norse and their friends that really perfected ocean-going ships in Europe and even they got to the "New" World using the Sea Ice/Northern Island hopping route - Iceland to Greenland, Greenland to Newfoundland and probably Newfoundland to the US East Coast (but the last one isn't proven yet).

 

[Sandune]

In Colonial America, the preferred mode of travel was by barge. The rivers were the highways of their times for there were no mountains to cross or heavy forested areas to get lost in. In his younger days George Washington surveyed canal systems for Virginia. Canals were vital to the economics of their times. If one should ever sail a small boat, it's amazing how little effort is required to travel many miles with just a little wind.

 

[Dosadi]

guessing games with very little to work with.

 

[packyderms_wife]

guessing games with very little to work with.

Sitting in dark storage rooms in museums across the planet is all of the evidence, with detailed notes, you will ever need. The problem is, as Melodi stated earlier, it's been suppressed by a few top dogs in order for them to maintain their lucrative careers. Personally I'm waiting for the day when the evidence is released proving my ancestors, and many other people groups, claim that we originated in the Pleiades.

NOTE that the peoples whose ancestors claim to have originated in the Pleiades also have the highest IQ's amongst all hominids.

 

[Tristan]

This Gentleman kind of eviscerates the "Clovis came from Siberia" theory. Not that people came from Siberia, by boat or by beach, but that the clovis points originated with those who migrated from Asia.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pY01NjND1jc

 

[Meadowlark]

More than once I have heard speculation that the Clovis people were of European origin. It will be a cold day in hell before the academics are willing to admit that.

 

[susie0884]

I tested my DNA against in an ancient DNA project of samples collected at various archaeological sites. http://www.y-str.org/p/ancient-dna.html My earliest matches are in Siberia. Then I have matches with Clovis boy in Montana and Kennewick man. I have no Native American heritage, so that must mean a group from the Siberian split off.

I also have matches with Must Farm - an archaeological site in Cambridgeshire, England where the Bronze Age community was built on posts off the marshy water.

http://www.mustfarm.com/bronze-age-settlement/about/

Here too, Marsh. I am a closer match to Kennewick man-with no known native ancestry-than my kids who have known native ancestry.

 

[Cardinal]

Sitting in dark storage rooms in museums across the planet is all of the evidence, with detailed notes, you will ever need. The problem is, as Melodi stated earlier, it's been suppressed by a few top dogs in order for them to maintain their lucrative careers. Personally I'm waiting for the day when the evidence is released proving my ancestors, and many other people groups, claim that we originated in the Pleiades.

NOTE that the peoples whose ancestors claim to have originated in the Pleiades also have the highest IQ's amongst all hominids.

Sounds interesting, care to expand on that?

 

[packyderms_wife]

Sounds interesting, care to expand on that?

Maybe later I'll post some info in the Alt News forum, I have a TO DO list that's huge today, sigh.

Say could you pester Dennis to change the Earth Changes forum name to History and Science (Or Science and History) so we can have a place to put articles like this so they don't die on the main or have to live in Alt News or Unexplained??? Pretty Please.

Prefixes to add to that forum would be

History
Archeology
Anthropology
Myths
Legends

Maybe Melodi has a few more to add to the list.

 

[Melodi]

I also think changing the Earth Changes area over to History and Science would be a good idea; most "Earth Changes" threads go to Woo anyway and/or they are on the main if it is about an earthquake. Science threads could still go there when they are about geology, volcanoes, the oceans currents etc.

 

[packyderms_wife]

I also think changing the Earth Changes area over to History and Science would be a good idea; most "Earth Changes" threads go to Woo anyway and/or they are on the main if it is about an earthquake. Science threads could still go there when they are about geology, volcanoes, the oceans currents etc.

Agreed!

Earth, History, and Science is another option as well.

 

[marsh]

ancestry.com came out with these new DNA ethnicity maps. I have a finer break down of my 97% European (85% "British,") 1% Asian but now I show an additional 30% NA and 1% Polynesian. (Adds up to more than 100%. My family was New England/Mid Atlantic from the 1600s until the mid 1800s. No known NA.

As I said, I don't think I descended from the NAs, it is rather, we descended from a common ancestor.

 

[packyderms_wife]

ancestry.com came out with these new DNA ethnicity maps. I have a finer break down of my 97% European (85% "British,") 1% Asian but now I show an additional 30% NA and 1% Polynesian. (Adds up to more than 100%. My family was New England/Mid Atlantic from the 1600s until the mid 1800s. No known NA.

As I said, I don't think I descended from the NAs, it is rather, we descended from a common ancestor.

I'm half white (quarter welsh and quarter german) and half micmac, yet my DNA (this was done at the doctors office to find out what genetic issues I may have been facing that was making me so sick at the time) showed that I was 73.2% Native American and the rest was northern european (Welsh/Celtic extraction).

Explain that one? Clearly someone somewhere jumped a fence or to. And like you my dad's grandparents have been here since the very early 1600's or earlier. grandma's kinfolk came here in the 1800's as indentured servants.

 

[Cardinal]

Maybe later I'll post some info in the Alt News forum, I have a TO DO list that's huge today, sigh.

Say could you pester Dennis to change the Earth Changes forum name to History and Science (Or Science and History) so we can have a place to put articles like this so they don't die on the main or have to live in Alt News or Unexplained??? Pretty Please.

Prefixes to add to that forum would be

History
Archeology
Anthropology
Myths
Legends

Maybe Melodi has a few more to add to the list.

Ok, he has been officially pestered.

 

[packyderms_wife]

Ok, he has been officially pestered.

Thank you!

 

[marsh]

http://absolutehistory.com/anthropo...ement-that-may-rewrite-north-american-history

Archaeologists In Canada Unearthed An Ice Age Settlement That May Rewrite North American History (photos on site)

It’s a story that has been passed down from generation to generation among the Heiltsuk Nation. Indeed, it forms part of the oral history of the Canadian people. Yet the narrative it portrays has challenged widespread conceptions about human migration in North America. And now, incredibly, archaeologists have found stunning evidence to prove it.
Image: Keith Holmes

Some 14,000 years ago, the North American continent was in the grip of an ice age. As a result, glaciers covered most of the land. Scientists have long believed that it was during this period that the first humans crossed into North America, traveling on foot across a land bridge between what is now Alaska and eastern Russia before moving further south via inland routes. However, a new discovery in northwestern Canada has challenged that belief.

The story the Heiltsuk people told concerned a strip of land along the west coast of Canada. In contrast to accepted scientific wisdom, their traditions claim that this piece of land didn’t freeze during the ice age. Consequently, they say, it was here that their ancestors took shelter from the freezing conditions. And as a result of these Heiltsuk beliefs, archaeologists recently turned their attention to an island called Triquet in British Columbia.

The team that made the incredible find consisted of researchers from a number of different institutions. These included local First Nations groups as well as the University of Victoria and the Hakai Institute. Together, the team members headed to Triquet Island to ascertain whether the Heiltsuk’s stories were rooted in fact.

To begin with, the expedition had to dig down through layers of soil and peat. Then, after cutting through several feet of earth, the researchers came upon a “paleosol.” This is a thin layer of fossil soil, and its discovery intrigued the archaeologists. However, it wasn’t the earth itself that was of interest but, rather, what the soil contained.

Within the paleosol, the researchers subsequently discovered the remains of an ancient hearth-like structure. What’s more, inside that hearth there were minuscule flecks of charcoal. Painstakingly, using tweezers, the team extracted these tiny pieces of burnt wood. When the fragments had finally been pulled out, they were then taken off to be carbon dated, and the results of these tests were astounding.
When the results came back, they confirmed the oral history of the Heiltsuk Nation. The settlement had been established around 14,000 years ago. The spit of land that the First Nation people had been telling stories about for so long had been found, and there were further revelations to come.

Alongside the charcoal fragments, the archaeologists found a number of other incredible items. For example, there were fish hooks and tools, while nearby the researchers discovered spears that would have been used to hunt marine mammals. There was also a hand drill, which could well have been utilized to start the fire that produced the charcoal.

To put the discovery into some historical context, the settlement found on Triquet Island is thousands of years older than the great Egyptian pyramids. It predates the Roman empire as well. In fact, it was around when animals such as mammoths still walked the Earth. And now it’s reshaping how scientists think humans first arrived in North America.

Until recently, the dominant theory was that after crossing on foot from what we now call Siberia, these early humans made their way south on foot along a route to the east of the Rockies. However, doubts have arisen regarding this hypothesis. For example, scientists have questioned whether there would have been enough resources for our ancestors to survive such an inland journey. And, indeed, the find on Triquet Island suggests another explanation.

It had long been held that the coast would have been uninhabitable during this period. But the evidence uncovered on Triquet Island seems to have shattered that belief. It does even more than that, though. In fact, it suggests that the earliest human migration into North America wasn’t made by land – but that our ancestors instead used the sea to make their first forays into the continent.

And thanks to the items found at Triquet, archaeologists now have evidence to support that idea. It seems that the ancestors of the Heiltsuk Nation could have been capable of moving along the coast of the land bridge into North America. What’s more, from there it appears that they continued to move deeper into the continent along the coast, rather than by land.

It was the spears that gave archaeologists this insight, as the weapons were clearly used to hunt large marine mammals. As a result, the researchers could conclude that these people must have been capable of taking to the waves. Other discoveries at the site have added even more credence to this theory. For example, one of the key pieces of evidence revolved around the diet of the Triquet habitants.

Indeed, further tests conducted on materials found during the dig indicate that for the first 7,000 years of human habitation, the diet on Triquet consisted primarily of seals and sea lions. This further supported the belief that the inhabitants of the island were capable seafarers. And through this insight, combined with the carbon dating, a new picture of early migration to North America started to appear.

Moreover, one additional piece of evidence really added credence to this new theory. It didn’t relate to the people living on Triquet Island, though. Instead, it was about the island itself. Researchers uncovered an important fact about Triquet that pointed to it having been habitable even when the rest of the continent was encased in ice.

The evidence they uncovered showed that the sea level at Triquet had been constant for more than 15,000 years. This degree of stability would, of course, have been vital in terms of making the island habitable for humans. Furthermore, it tallies well with the stories of the Heiltsuk Nation – and indeed, that’s perhaps the most important part of this story.

You see, the confirmation of the Heiltsuk’s oral history could have a major impact on the lives of the descendants of the inhabitants of Triquet Island. The First Nation people still struggle with land rights claims. However, now their oral history is backed up with archaeological evidence, which could make a huge difference.

“So now we don’t just have oral history, we have this archaeological information,” William Housty, a member of the Heiltsuk Nation, told CBC News. “It’s not just an arbitrary thing that anyone’s making up… We have a history supported from Western science and archaeology.”

 

[packyderms_wife]

You see, the confirmation of the Heiltsuk’s oral history could have a major impact on the lives of the descendants of the inhabitants of Triquet Island. The First Nation people still struggle with land rights claims. However, now their oral history is backed up with archaeological evidence, which could make a huge difference.

“So now we don’t just have oral history, we have this archaeological information,” William Housty, a member of the Heiltsuk Nation, told CBC News. “It’s not just an arbitrary thing that anyone’s making up… We have a history supported from Western science and archaeology.”

Ten years ago this information would have been buried and deeply!

 

[tanstaafl]

For what it's worth, the continental shelf on the West Coast isn't exactly like the one on the East Coast. The West Coast continental shelf is much narrower and gets deeper much faster than the East Coast continental shelf. While there is some margin for land being exposed with much lower sea levels, the distance usually isn't measured in the hundreds of miles of new land surface like it is on the East Coast. My point being that it's possible that the current coastal geology may in many ways be similar to the coastal geology you'd have seen with lower sea levels (that is, for long stretches of coastline there's often not much in the way of large expanses of flat land or even beaches).

Which to me suggests that it wasn't remotely a picnic to migrate by walking down the coast from Alaska to southern California. In fact, when the whites arrived in the area they often found the indian tribes hugging the coast because in many places it was difficult to travel inland. Bushwhacking west of the Cascades is damned slow work even today, and I have nothing but respect for the people who brought wagons over and through that mess. Which in turn suggests to me that the ancient peoples did, in fact, use boats for large chunks of that migration. No matter how much work they had to put in building those boats, it would still have been easier than going the whole way on foot.

 

[packyderms_wife]

For what it's worth, the continental shelf on the West Coast isn't exactly like the one on the East Coast. The West Coast continental shelf is much narrower and gets deeper much faster than the East Coast continental shelf. While there is some margin for land being exposed with much lower sea levels, the distance usually isn't measured in the hundreds of miles of new land surface like it is on the East Coast. My point being that it's possible that the current coastal geology may in many ways be similar to the coastal geology you'd have seen with lower sea levels (that is, for long stretches of coastline there's often not much in the way of large expanses of flat land or even beaches).

Which to me suggests that it wasn't remotely a picnic to migrate by walking down the coast from Alaska to southern California. In fact, when the whites arrived in the area they often found the indian tribes hugging the coast because in many places it was difficult to travel inland. Bushwhacking west of the Cascades is damned slow work even today, and I have nothing but respect for the people who brought wagons over and through that mess. Which in turn suggests to me that the ancient peoples did, in fact, use boats for large chunks of that migration. No matter how much work they had to put in building those boats, it would still have been easier than going the whole way on foot.

when going inland they followed the trails of the local wildlife, which would be narrow and often on perilous ground.

 

[tanstaafl]

As far as I'm concerned, hiking off trail in the wilder parts west of the Cascades is even worse than bushwhacking through the Amazon (not that I've been to the Amazon for direct comparison). You'd think moss and ferns would be no big deal, but they often grow very tall and hide fallen trees, holes, and gullies that makes practically every step an adventure in itself. Not to mention making everything more slippery in an environment that can be as much vertical as horizontal.

As you say, game trials are traditionally the basis for human trails, but even so the early white explorers to the PNW really did find tribes hugging the coast and sometimes actually terrified of going very far inland. On the other hand, those white explorers often found lots of fat indians along the coast, which means the natives didn't have to range far and wide into the interior to find enough food. Which isn't to say there weren't tribes inland, just that those tribes and the coast tribes didn't casually cross back and forth over the Cascades for visits and/or raids.

Keep in mind also that the Columbia River, with some very deadly falls prior to building the big dams, and the Klamath River are the only water breaks through the Cascades from central British Columbia all the way down to central California, so traveling to-and-from the interior by water wasn't a simple matter. It might also be worth mentioning for the OP scenario that the coast tribes made very long ocean-going canoes which in some cases could approach the length of the European ships -- the trees out here can be very tall, making a dugout of exceptional length just a matter of a lot of work.

 

[packyderms_wife]

As far as I'm concerned, hiking off trail in the wilder parts west of the Cascades is even worse than bushwhacking through the Amazon (not that I've been to the Amazon for direct comparison). You'd think moss and ferns would be no big deal, but they often grow very tall and hide fallen trees, holes, and gullies that makes practically every step an adventure in itself. Not to mention making everything more slippery in an environment that can be as much vertical as horizontal.

As you say, game trials are traditionally the basis for human trails, but even so the early white explorers to the PNW really did find tribes hugging the coast and sometimes actually terrified of going very far inland. On the other hand, those white explorers often found lots of fat indians along the coast, which means the natives didn't have to range far and wide into the interior to find enough food. Which isn't to say there weren't tribes inland, just that those tribes and the coast tribes didn't casually cross back and forth over the Cascades for visits and/or raids.

Keep in mind also that the Columbia River, with some very deadly falls prior to building the big dams, and the Klamath River are the only water breaks through the Cascades from central British Columbia all the way down to central California, so traveling to-and-from the interior by water wasn't a simple matter. It might also be worth mentioning for the OP scenario that the coast tribes made very long ocean-going canoes which in some cases could approach the length of the European ships -- the trees out here can be very tall, making a dugout of exceptional length just a matter of a lot of work.

Out here on the plains and prairie the natives followed streams, rivers, etc. It's my understanding they traversed them when the water was low and used round boats constructed of buffalo hides and rib bones to float their items down stream. I'm guessing a raft lashed together with cording made from various inner tree barks and grasses could have also been used. And then there are the birch bark canoes. Even after parts of the west were settled very often people went to down via the river or the stream. I think humans have been utilizing water craft for far longer than we've been told.

 

[tanstaafl]

It seems that the Haida tribe (northern British Columbia and southeastern Alaska) made ocean-going dugout canoes up to about 65 feet long, while for comparison the Mayflower was about 100 feet at or below the waterline and about 80 feet on deck. Of course, it's unlikely the ancient migrations used comparable boats to the Haida or the Polynesians, both of which probably required a long period of refining the boat-building process to get to the end results, but the point is that with some hands-on boating experience it doesn't have to be just lashing some logs together and hoping the wind and current takes you somewhere useful.

For those interested in just how far you can go in building a large dugout canoe capable of cruising the open ocean (in many ways always staying close to shore is more dangerous than the open ocean), here's a Web site I found that looks very interesting (I'll go back later to read it in more detail):

Canoes of the First Nations of the Pacific Northwest
http://www.donsmaps.com/canoesnwc.html

 

[marsh]

Here is a Yurok redwood dugout canoe. They would have used this on the Klamath. I guess they also used it in the ocean. The Hoopa were and offshoot of the Yurok so theirs would have been similar for the Trinity River. The Karuk would have used one below Ishi Pishi falls and likely up the Salmon River. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6eVeMWFenw The Shasta were a plains tribe type. I don't know what sort of boat they had, if any. There are few redwood trees further up river.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=be8Mqe3SYE0

This youtube is of a tule boat from a coastal tribe further south. I would imagine that The Klamath tribe used such boats because that was a material readily available to them https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=be8Mqe3SYE0

 

[LightEcho]

I also think changing the Earth Changes area over to History and Science would be a good idea; most "Earth Changes" threads go to Woo anyway and/or they are on the main if it is about an earthquake. Science threads could still go there when they are about geology, volcanoes, the oceans currents etc.

Maybe later I'll post some info in the Alt News forum, I have a TO DO list that's huge today, sigh.

Say could you pester Dennis to change the Earth Changes forum name to History and Science (Or Science and History) so we can have a place to put articles like this so they don't die on the main or have to live in Alt News or Unexplained??? Pretty Please.

Prefixes to add to that forum would be

History
Archeology
Anthropology
Myths
Legends

Maybe Melodi has a few more to add to the list.

Ok, he has been officially pestered.

BAD IDEA. Earth Changes- refers to the MULTITUDE of events affecting the physical earth. This includes space weather, magnetic field changes, solar activity, earthquakes, volcanoes, land and island shifts, weather/climate changes, fauna & flora impacts, chemical and dust impacts, etc. It is not a human genealogy study.

Claiming it is mostly "woo" is pretty foolish. I'll tell you what is "woo".... the variety of pet postulations on human race and expansion through history. That is a scratching science looking for answer but based on political support. If you want to start a new area for that, fine. Don't go planning to bombard another topical area as if your interest is more preeminent. Just as the so-called "native americans" came to this land as foreigners and wiped out previously existing civilizations, you want to supplant another topical discussion. Start your own.

BTW- you want to scorn real science of earth changes and you harbor a Pleidians-human hybrid philosophy as better than "woo"? Yeah, right.

 

[Wolfcreek Farm]

I'm half white (quarter welsh and quarter german) and half micmac, yet my DNA (this was done at the doctors office to find out what genetic issues I may have been facing that was making me so sick at the time) showed that I was 73.2% Native American and the rest was northern european (Welsh/Celtic extraction).

Explain that one? Clearly someone somewhere jumped a fence or to. And like you my dad's grandparents have been here since the very early 1600's or earlier. grandma's kinfolk came here in the 1800's as indentured servants.

I do believe you will find your answer if you read some of Dr. Barry Fell's books on America......the Celts and Welsh were here many thousands of years ago......Welsh armor has been found in some of the Serpent Mounds of middle America. I then would suggest you read some of Frank Joseph's books on early civilization. Harry Truman once said...."The only thing new in the world is the history you didn't know."

 

[Melodi]

BAD IDEA. Earth Changes- refers to the MULTITUDE of events affecting the physical earth. This includes space weather, magnetic field changes, solar activity, earthquakes, volcanoes, land and island shifts, weather/climate changes, fauna & flora impacts, chemical and dust impacts, etc. It is not a human genealogy study.

Claiming it is mostly "woo" is pretty foolish. I'll tell you what is "woo".... the variety of pet postulations on human race and expansion through history. That is a scratching science looking for answer but based on political support. If you want to start a new area for that, fine. Don't go planning to bombard another topical area as if your interest is more preeminent. Just as the so-called "native americans" came to this land as foreigners and wiped out previously existing civilizations, you want to supplant another topical discussion. Start your own.

BTW- you want to scorn real science of earth changes and you harbor a Pleidians-human hybrid philosophy as better than "woo"? Yeah, right.

Sorry, I did not mean to imply that Earth Changes IS Woo, simply that most stories connected to it tend to end up either lost on the main after a major event or END UP in our Unexplained room (aka proper place for woo) partly because there tend to be aspects of the information that can be woo; or considered to be woo by some people.

I am a regular in the Unexplained room; that's where we have our earthquake "prediction" threads and other fun stuff; but because a lot of it is science is why I think expanding that room to handle archeology, history, geology, science etc IS a good idea.

As it is, the "Earth Changes" room on its own is pretty dead, another reason I think little gets posted there.

 

[Faroe]

I do believe you will find your answer if you read some of Dr. Barry Fell's books on America......the Celts and Welsh were here many thousands of years ago......Welsh armor has been found in some of the Serpent Mounds of middle America. I then would suggest you read some of Frank Joseph's books on early civilization. Harry Truman once said...."The only thing new in the world is the history you didn't know."

Agree. The Piri Ries (spell?) map proves people have been navigating extensively, centuries before anyone supposedly had a time piece accurate enough to calculate longitude. No, I don't know how they did that. The only other alternatives to explain the accuracy and detail of the Piri Ries (sp) map would be that aliens shared with us pictures they took from space, or someone remotely viewed the earth in an out-of-body experience. Neither of these counts as something most people are willing to go with. I prefer the simpler earlier expeditions explanation too, and that is backed up by evidence of Chinese navigation, and evidence of secret Templar trips, possibly to stash valuable stuff found during the Crusades (and also Joan of Arc's sword). People have been sailing around the globe (and apparently not getting too horribly lost) for a very long time.

 

[packyderms_wife]

BAD IDEA. Earth Changes- refers to the MULTITUDE of events affecting the physical earth. This includes space weather, magnetic field changes, solar activity, earthquakes, volcanoes, land and island shifts, weather/climate changes, fauna & flora impacts, chemical and dust impacts, etc. It is not a human genealogy study.

Claiming it is mostly "woo" is pretty foolish. I'll tell you what is "woo".... the variety of pet postulations on human race and expansion through history. That is a scratching science looking for answer but based on political support. If you want to start a new area for that, fine. Don't go planning to bombard another topical area as if your interest is more preeminent. Just as the so-called "native americans" came to this land as foreigners and wiped out previously existing civilizations, you want to supplant another topical discussion. Start your own.

BTW- you want to scorn real science of earth changes and you harbor a Pleidians-human hybrid philosophy as better than "woo"? Yeah, right.

Sorry, I did not mean to imply that Earth Changes IS Woo, simply that most stories connected to it tend to end up either lost on the main after a major event or END UP in our Unexplained room (aka proper place for woo) partly because there tend to be aspects of the information that can be woo; or considered to be woo by some people.

I am a regular in the Unexplained room; that's where we have our earthquake "prediction" threads and other fun stuff; but because a lot of it is science is why I think expanding that room to handle archeology, history, geology, science etc IS a good idea.

As it is, the "Earth Changes" room on its own is pretty dead, another reason I think little gets posted there.

What Melodi said!

 

[tanstaafl]

I'm not sure how valid a conclusion it is to assume that just because a group has river boats that those very same boats would work just fine in the open ocean for the relatively long distances required for a migration. The Mongols learned the hard way they couldn't just grab a bunch of Chinese river boats and use them to invade Japan, even though Japan isn't all that far off the coast of Asia. River boats have a nasty habit of capsizing in the open ocean at practically the first change in the weather or in the waves. The Haida's huge ocean-going canoes aren't just something anyone can build with a sharp rock and a lot of patience -- they're actually fairly sophisticated and built differently from the much smaller river canoes.

The guy mentions in the video that he'll be part of a re-enacted meeting of the Tule tribe with Sir Francis Drake. I think in discussing North American history it always bears mentioning that Drake was raiding Spanish ships and settlements on the West Coast even before Jamestown was founded. The point being that Europeans were traveling to the West Coast before they had large numbers of people on the East Coast. Which is to say, sea routes were being utilized before land routes.