An Anthropological Conception of the Initial Peopling of the Americas

ABSTRACT A currently popular model of the initial settlement of the Americas proposes a very rapid occupation of both continents beginning with the initial entry in early postglacial times. Considering the ethnographic record of small-group hunter-gatherer adaptive skill and social networking, I argue that the peopling of the two immense and diverse continents must have been a slow process of local adaptation, and initial entry must have begun before the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). After the LGM, the early populations that already had occupied both continents in low density expanded rapidly in the improved postglacial climatic conditions, with the resulting increase in archaeological sites creating the illusion of late and rapid peopling. Presently known pre-LGM archaeological sites are summarized, and discovery of more sites is to be expected.