Mexico City: A team of Mexican archaeologists have discovered hundreds of rudimentary man-made tools and artefacts that date back between 8,000-11,000
years in the northwestern state of Baja California Sur.
The objects were found at an archaeological site known as El Coyote, located in the Los Cabos region, the National Anthropology and History Institute,
or INAH, said.
It added that they "bolster the hypothesis" that the first colonists of the hemisphere populated the region via watercraft migration, following
coastlines from northeast Asia southward into the Americas.
The researchers found cut and polished seashells, fishing devices and stone tools used for cutting and scraping (choppers, percussive devices, planes,
scrapers and knives) that date back between 8,600 and 9,300 years.
Those tools were used to work with plant fibres and wood, as well as for prying open mollusc shells.
Archaeologists have found similar artefacts in that region over the past three years, leading them to believe that the first settlers of the Americas
moved down the coast and arrived what is today known as the Baja California peninsula during the latter part of the Early Holocene era.
Human skeletons have not yet been discovered and therefore it is "impossible to know to which ethnic group (the inhabitants of El Coyote) belonged",
the INAH said.Woooosh - 10-20-2011 at 11:44 PM
Dennis dropped them when he was a kid. David K - 10-21-2011 at 01:49 AM
bajalera will like reading this!wessongroup - 10-21-2011 at 01:57 AM
Now we know where "fish tacos" came from ... truly amazing... given the time "frame" .... looks like everyone started up around the same time after
the ice age...JESSE - 10-21-2011 at 02:23 AM
Makes you think just how small our own stay in baja is.Osprey - 10-21-2011 at 05:43 AM
Some of you know my book Baja Blues and Blessings about the central Baja cave paintings posits the painters could be pilgrims (arriving from what is
now northern Japan) in boats coast hopping all the way to end of the peninsula. Each find like this one (and there are thousands more to come) I
believe will show many groups of those early tourists coming here over a very long period of time going back more than 20,000 years, long before the
Bering sea walk-down.Iflyfish - 10-21-2011 at 09:23 AM
This is just the tip of the spear point. More will emerge. Great post.
IflyfishMartyman - 10-21-2011 at 09:29 AM
How many clamshells did they need for two weeks in Ensenada?Hook - 10-21-2011 at 09:29 AM
What? No DK photo spread?BajaNews - 10-21-2011 at 09:40 AM
A photo released Wednesday of rudimentary man-made tools and artifacts dating back to the Early Holocene era (between 8,000 and 11,000 years ago).
EFE/INAH
Originally posted by Hook
What? No DK photo spread?
Sorry, I wasn't there THAT long ago!sancho - 10-21-2011 at 12:10 PM
Quote:
Originally posted by Woooosh
Dennis dropped them when he was a kid.
That's funny, I didn't know D ever went so. of Maneadero. Just kidding D
[Edited on 10-21-2011 by sancho]DENNIS - 10-21-2011 at 12:31 PM
Quote:
Originally posted by sancho
Quote:
Originally posted by Woooosh
Dennis dropped them when he was a kid.
That's funny, I didn't know D ever went so. of Maneadero. Just kidding D
You are both soooo disrespectful, and just to show you that I do get out and about, I'm off to Sharky's to alter my personality. BajaBlanca - 10-21-2011 at 01:03 PM
so many artifacts all over - we need some resident archeologists in every pueblo ...wilderone - 10-23-2011 at 08:16 AM
Si, artifacts everywhere. There has been much excavation and artifacts found on the Channel Islands - dating to 9,000-12,000 years old.
Archaeologists have stated that the coastlines and proximity to mainland has shifted (was closer thousands of years ago). While hiking on San Miguel
island, I asked the ranger about a type of rock that was in the area, and he told me that the same rock was found in Poway (outside of San Diego), as
evidence of the shifting plates. As a nomadic populace, and as Mike Younghusband has proven (!), it's not at all implausible to accept that people
wandered great distances up and down the Pacific coast, and now we know that they did so that long ago. The islanders made dug-out boats out of the
logs that drifted onto their beaches from northern California coastal forests. Did whaling from those boats.David K - 10-23-2011 at 09:49 AM
During the Ice Age, sea levels were lower and that is how man walked to Alaska from Asia, perhaps what are now coastal islands were connected my land
bridges, like the Coronado islands were off Rosarito/Tijuana ... The world has been warming ever since the ice age until the cycle repeats it self as
it has for millions of years.Mexitron - 10-23-2011 at 09:57 AM
Quote:
Originally posted by David K
During the Ice Age, sea levels were lower and that is how man walked to Alaska from Asia, perhaps what are now coastal islands were connected my land
bridges, like the Coronado islands were off Rosarito/Tijuana ... The world has been warming ever since the ice age until the cycle repeats it self as
it has for millions of years.
True dat---the problem then is that all the coastal sites before 12K years ago are covered by water...20K years ago the sea level was 300 feet lower
so its hard to prove the seafaring theory, though many archaeologists are starting to think the Bering land bridge was only one of many routes in and
that boat hopping the coast was very likely.Ateo - 10-23-2011 at 11:50 AM
I thought the earth was only 6000 years old?😃Cypress - 10-23-2011 at 11:56 AM
Found a hand tool, looks like a big(4") arrowhead, it's in perfect condition. Appears to be made of the same type stone as those pieces pictured. Nice
to know how old it could be. dtbushpilot - 10-23-2011 at 01:38 PM
Some of them look like "sex stones" .....Cypress - 10-23-2011 at 02:48 PM
Yea!wilderone - 10-24-2011 at 09:31 AM
"---the problem then is that all the coastal sites before 12K years ago are covered by water...20K years ago the sea level was 300 feet lower"
There are dinosaur bones - land dwelling mammals - on Punta Baja and the coastal cliffs a few miles south. It is generally believed that "the "Late
Cretaceous shoreline in the vicinity of El Rosario occupied approximately the same position as it does today." (Durham and Allison 1960). Mammoth
bones on the channel islands. And plenty of evidence showing man co-existed with mammoths. I don't think all coastal sites before 12K years ago
were covered in [sea] water. Also consider there were forests, lagoons and estuaries where today you find tree and mammal fossils.oladulce - 10-24-2011 at 10:03 AM
Wandering around my backyard among the matates and manos (grinding tools), scrapers and shell middens, and dreaming about the people who had also
wandered here...
How long ago they were here is so far over my head that I settle for the simple questions like "how the heck did these people walk around without
having feet full of cholla and pitaya stickers like to 2" thick layer of spines that cover my shoes?"
It never occurred to me that the stuff I find might be so old that there wasn't cholla and pitaya here back then. Exciting stuff.
But how many times have you found an "artifact" and thought you had something really special until you saw the old faded Tecate cans buried in the
dirt right next to it?
.....