Prehistoric Man and His Environments

Prehistoric Man and His Environments: A Case Study in the Ozark Highland offers a preliminary model for the paleoecology of the western Ozark Highland in Missouri for the last 35,000 years and an interpretation of how humans have adapted to and exploited the area for the 10,500 years they are known to have lived there. The model, a set of hypotheses that includes a putative explanatory framework for the observations made at Ozark, is based on more than a decade of interdisciplinary fieldwork.

Comprised of 14 chapters, this volume begins with a background on the interdisciplinary studies undertaken in the Pomme de Terre River Valley. The research has centered on the post-glacial deposits at the Rodgers Shelter and on five nearby spring bogs, each of which contained the bones of extinct mammals, pollen, and other material dating from late Pleistocene and early Holocene times. The archaeological investigations and subsequent analyses of these sites are discussed in detail. Sedimentary processes, changing subsistence patterns, material culture, and human burials at Rodgers Shelter are then analyzed. The final chapter describes the direction of research in the Ozark Highland, including plans to test aspects of the proposed model.

This book will be of interest to anthropologists, archaeologists, geographers, geologists, and botanists.

Contenu

List of Contributors
Acknowledgments
I The Program
1 Interdisciplinary Studies in the Pomme de Terre River Valley
2 The Pomme de Terre Study Locality: Its Setting
Geography and Geology
Mineral Resources
Soils
Climate
Flora
Historical Models
Fauna
References
II Quaternary Environments
3 Late Quaternary Geology of the Lower Pomme de Terre Valley
Older Terrace Deposits
Intermediate Terrace Deposits
Floodplain Deposits
Summary and Conclusions
References
4 Late Quaternary Biotic Records from Spring Deposits in Western Missouri
Flora and Radiocarbon Dates
Fauna
Discussion and Summary
References
III The Question of Man's Antiquity
5 Man and Mastodon: A Review of Koch's 1840 Pomme de Terre Expeditions
The St. Louis Museum
Koch's Fossil Discoveries
The Osage Country
The Missouri Leviathan
An Evaluation
References
6 Archaeological Investigations at the Pomme de Terre Springs
Trolinger Spring
Boney Spring
Koch Spring
References
IV Man and his Environment
7 Rodgers Shelter: A Record of Cultural and Environmental Change
Physical Description
Excavation Strategies
Correlation of Levels
8 Sedimentary Processes at Rodgers Shelter
Analytical Procedures and Results
Rodgers Shelter Stratigraphy
References
9 Changing Subsistence Patterns at Rodgers Shelter
Plant Foods
Fauna
References
10 Material Culture at Rodgers Shelter: A Reflection of Past Human Activities
Functional Artifact Categories
Activities
References
11 Human Burials from Rodgers Shelter
Burial 1
Burial 2
Pathologies
Discussion
Conclusions
References
12 The Dynamics of Cultural and Environmental Change at Rodgers Shelter, Missouri
Analysis of Chronological Variation
Changing Patterns of Human Adaptation
Environmental Change and Cultural Adaptation
References
V Synopsis and Epilogue
13 A Summary of Environmental and Cultural Change in the Western Missouri Ozarks
14 Models in Western Missouri Paleoecology and Prehistory: The Future
Project Bibliography
VI Appendices
Appendix A Potential Food Plants of the Western Missouri Ozarks
Appendix B Forest Density and Nut Production Potential for the Rodgers Shelter Area
Index